Product Description
Collected for the first time in English, the complete prose works of Dante Alighieri.
Dante Alighieri (1265–1321) is known the world over for the Divine Comedy, arguably the greatest poem ever written. But that was not all he wrote. Several other prose texts round out the great poet’s ouevre. In these two volumes we have the rest of what Dante wrote. Volume I: The Italian Works (this work): The Vita nuova and The Convivio; Volume II: The Latin Works: De vulgari eloquentia, De monarchia, Epistolae, and Questio de aqua et terra.
About this Collection
These two volumes bring together for the first time in English the “other” works of Dante. Most readers of Dante are only acquainted with the Divine Comedy, and understandably so. Some know about his youthful Vita nuova in which he tells the story of his love for Beatrice. But many have never even heard of his other works. Whereas Vita nuova combines poetry and prose to praise the loveliness of Beatrice, the Convivio does the same in praise of Philosophy. Had it been completed (it was abandoned just before Dante began the Comedy), the Convivio would have been a major achievement. The first philosophical treatise in the Italian language (and almost in any vernacular outside of Latin!), the Convivio brings together Dante’s intense love of reason and theology, poetry and philosophy, cosmology and ethics. Even in its unfinished state, it remains a fascinating testimony to the mind behind the Comedy. These two works, both originally written in Italian, comprise Volume I.
Volume II: The Latin Works include De vulgari eloquentia (On the Eloquence of the Vernacular), De monarchia (On the Monarchy), Dante’s thirteen surviving epistles, and the manuscript of a scientific lecture on Aristotelean geography, titled Questio de aqua et terra. Book 1 of the De vulgari eloquentia defends the use of the vernacular languages (mainly French, Spanish, and Italian) to discuss the noble themes of love and war, while Book 2 leaves us with an unfinished lecture on poetry, its forms, styles, and its unique power to communicate. De monarcha is a political treatise in which he argues for world empire as the best (and most Christian!) form of government. Arguing indirectly against the papal bull Unam Sanctam, Dante clearly articulates and distinguishes the twin authorities of the emperor and the pope. Contrary to prevailing Catholic thought at the time, he argued that the political leader received his authority directly from Christ, not mediated through the pope. In this work he outlines his theory of the “two suns” (the heads of the Church and State; see Purg. XVI.106-108) and their respective spheres of responsibility. His epistles give us rare and intimate insight into the mind of the man, his hopes and desires for Florence and Italy, as well as a concrete explanation of the Divine Comedy. Finally, as noted above, the Questio de aqua et terra dives into medieval cosmological issues. Though his natural science is obsolete, his tight reasoning presents a sharp mind, attuned to the nuances of scientific and philosophical arguments.
While the Comedy is certainly his most important contribution to what C. S. Lewis called “Old Western Culture,” Dante’s other works brilliantly attest to his extensive reading and learning, his tremendous ability to digest and synthesize the teachings of others, his innate skill as a rhetorician, and his singularly inquisitive mind.
Compiled here together for the first time are the excellent translations of Charles Eliot Norton (Vita nuova), Philip H. Wicksteed (Convivio, De vulgari eloquentia, and Questio), Aurelia Henry Reinhardt (De monarchia), and Paget Toynbee (Epistolae), lightly edited for a modern audience, and organized to conform to modern reference systems. In addition to original introductions to each of the works, these volumes include a bevy of new notes and explanations from Dante scholar and translator, Joe Carlson, in which he identifies the numerous intertextual allusions to the Comedy contained within these works.